It was only last month that Kylian Mbappé suggested all roads may lead to Florida.
He was in sufficiently mischievous mood to reveal David Beckham had been chewing his ear off about a move to Major League Soccer, dangling the prospect of a reunion with Lionel Messi at Inter Miami.
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"We will see, I don't know," said Mbappé, Captain of France. "The American culture is different.
There are no limits to ambitions, I like it."
Yet Mbappé will walk out in Miami on Saturday nursing clipped wings and thwarted aspirations. The third-place playoff retains some prestige given the names involved.
But it pales in comparison with the broken dream of another final; the regrets from France’s last-four exit to Spain, their third in three years against the European champions, will linger into the American summer.
France’s no-show on Tuesday makes the sands of time run a little faster for Mbappé.
It feels a cruel trick that he will be 31 when the next World Cup comes around.
At his current rate, he will have made about 700 appearances by then and there are no guarantees a body of work defined by explosive power can hold up into his fourth decade.
Mbappé has nothing to prove, but this tournament had seemed a natural stage for a mid-career rubber stamping of his legacy.
That may still come around in diluted form.
No player has won two consecutive Golden Boots and, even when looking to the sky upon the final whistle and mopping his head with his shirt, Mbappé stood top of that ranking by virtue of having more assists than Messi.
